


The Only One Who Could Ever Reach Me

by uschickens



Category: NSYNC
Genre: Alternate Universe - Not Famous, Bobbie Gentry, I appear to have perpetrated song!fic, M/M, Parents
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-24
Updated: 2010-01-24
Packaged: 2017-10-06 16:17:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/55535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uschickens/pseuds/uschickens
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Chris moved home for his residency and little Jimmy was all grown up?</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Only One Who Could Ever Reach Me

Chris skidded around the corner of the kitchen in socked feet, nearly dropping his bowl of cereal. "Mom. I didn't know we had company." Bev's mouth smiled, but she stared pointedly at her son's boxer shorts and very obviously just-woken-up hair. Chris moved to stand behind a potted ficus. There was no one quite like your mom for making you feel twelve again.

"Honey, you remember -" Bev said.

Dr. Bass set his coffee cup down and interrupted her with a smile. "I doubt he's been away long enough to forget me. Chris, it's good to see you again."

Chris reached around the ficus to shake his hand with feeling. Visions of Lizzie Jenkins, the rooftop of the local Wal-Mart, mysteriously vanishing communion wine, and Lizzie Jenkins' older brother flooded back. "Sir, there aren't enough years in a century to make me forget you." Dr. Bass laughed and winked at him when Bev was refilling the coffee cups.

"I trust you've been staying out of trouble these last few years? Living on the straight and narrow?"

Chris grinned. "The narrow, at least. You'd have to ask my advisor about exactly how much trouble I'm staying out of."

"Two more years, and we'll actually have a doctor in the family. People tell me I should find it hard to belive, but I don't," Bev said. She quirked a grin at Chris. Just as quickly as his mom could make him feel twelve years old, she could make him feel twelve hundred feet tall. Perhaps there were some perks to moving back home to finish school.

"Just remember it's in psychiatry, Mom. No patching up the girls when they fall out of trees."

"Or off of rooves," a deep voice said from the hallway. Chris looked up from his cereal, inhaled unexpectedly, then did his best to dislodge the Lucky Charms that he felt sure were now permanently embedded in his sinus cavity.

Dr. Bass smiled again. "Chris, you remember my son."

"Little Jimmy grew up," Chris managed around the yellow star - or possibly a red balloon - in his nose.

"Actually, I go by Lance now," he said, a flash of long-suffering glancing across his face. "Too many Jameses in my high school."

"You got tall," Chris said.

"It's been six years," Lance said, dry as the Sahara. "I should hope so."

"Point," Chris said, trying not to stare. In addition to the extra inches of height, Jimmy - _Lance_ \- had lost the bowl cut in favor of artfully arranged blond spikes. Gone were the days of the collared polo shirts and chinos, replaced a too-tight tee underneath a strategically unbuttoned shirt, and, really, why had his father let him out of the house in those jeans? The last time they'd spoke, after Chris had stopped babysitting Lance and Lance had started babysitting Chris's littlest sister, Lance had been squawking his way through adolescence. Things seemed to have settled now. Low. Very low.

Chris shuffled even further behind the ficus.

"Hon, don't forget Taylor needs to be walked home from playgroup in half an hour," Bev said, giving his boxers the stinkeye again.

"Yeah, I'll just go-" Chris flapped his hand in the direction of his bedroom. And his pants.

"Want company?" Lance asked. Chris's hand faltered mid-flop. "For the walk, I mean." His green eyes were as wide and innocent as Chris remembered. He didn't trust them then; he didn't trust them now.

"That'd be great, son," Dr. Bass overrode any response Chris could've made. "You can head on over to the church again from there, and I'll meet up with you as soon as Bev and I have finished with the committee arrangements." Lance smiled sweetly at his father, eyes never leaving Chris, who promptly set his cereal bowl down in the ficus.

Chris had to squeeze past Lance in the narrow hallway. Lance made zero effort to get out of his way. They never touched, but Chris could feel the heat from Lance's body through his thin t-shirt and damnable boxers. "You might want to hurry," Lance said, low enough to verge on a rumble. "You wouldn't want to be late for your sister." Chris knew that tone of voice, had _taught_ Lance that tone of voice, just like he taught him to achieve maximum distance with his spitballs, and Chris needed to stop _thinking_, so he only managed a single raised eyebrow before ducking into his room and closing the door firmly.

When he reemerged, Chris was newly armed with a sense of perspective. And pants. If those pants happened to be the jeans he wore when he was looking for a little attention, well, who was he to tell? Lance may have grown up very nicely, may even have surprised him, but that didn't mean Chris was that easy.

Well, that simple, Chris amended mentally.

Lance was still lounging in the doorway to the living room, giving his best impression of propping up the wall. He smirked at Chris again, and Chris deliberately brushed up against him as he passed by. As innocent as Chris ever was in front of his mother, but Chris was close enough to see Lance's pupils dilate. Heh. Chris knew how to play this game.

"Mom, I'll be back in an hour or so. Dr. Bass," Chris tipped an imaginary hat at him. "Tell your wife I'm still waiting for her to leave you and run away with me to raise llamas together." Dr. Bass laughed out loud and waved farewell. "C'mon, Jimmy," Chris said, reaching behing him to stick two fingers beneath Lance's waistband and drag him along. "We don't want to be late."

Chris could feel the taut muscles of Lance's stomach quiver with laughter beneath his fingers. Yes, moving home might have been an even better idea than he'd ever suspected.


End file.
